Extra usability won't mean a 2+2 seat layout, he said, but instead it'll be easier to get in and out of thanks to redesigned sills on the same carbon-fibre tub that underpins the 650S. It will also have more luggage space.

McLaren acknowledges that the £120,000 price band has a far greater spread of competitors, which buyers also likely to look at cars ranging from the Bentley Continental GT to the Aston Martin DB9 and the Audi R8. "But I would be disappointed if it wasn't the best driving car in the segment it went into," Flewitt said.

What McLaren won't do is go any lower than that in terms of price. "I don't think we can go below P13," Flewitt said. "Below that we can't have the cutting edge technology we need."

McLaren is targeting sales of between 3,500-4,000 cars in 2016, up from around 1,400 last year, the company has said. The bulk of that growth is expected to come from the P13, with variations of the 650S making up the rest.

The company will also produce a car above the 650S and below the sold-out £866,000 P1 hybrid hypercar in the medium-term, a spokesman said, without giving a specific launch year. That project is currently codenamed P15.

That car is likely to stick to two-seater mid-engined format McLaren started with when it launched the MP4-12C in 2011. "I won't do a 2+2 in the short term, I want to keep the brand much more focused," Mike Flewitt said. "People are still learning what McLaren is and you can't start diluting that. That's our niche, we can push boundaries in time, but 2+2 is starting to move to a utility aspect taking precedence over the driving."

Next year's P13 will wear the family face first seen on the P1 and repeated in the successful 650S update of the 12C, according to designer Frank Stephenson. At the recently 650S launch he told journalists it'll likely wear what he called the 'jowled' headlights of the 650S and P1.